Wednesday, February 21, 2018

When some naysayers ask me why do I demand respect for famous LGBTQs of color during Black History Month, my answer is simple:

"I'm like Glenn Close in 'Fatal Attraction.' I will NOT be ignored."

The following videos are simple reminders that the LGBTQ and the African-American communities are more intertwined than folks like to admit.

And another video because transgender African-Americans don't really get their due. I love this video because it includes some contemporary people, including some very good friends of mine (yes, I'm name-droppping):

'Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria' Is Biased Junk Science- Some things never change, unfortunately. They used to go all out in their usage of junk science to smear gay men as unhealthy pedophiles. Now the same crowd is attacking the transgender community (particularly transgender children) using the same tactics. Sorry folks. We are hip and this mess ain't gonna play.

Tuesday, February 20, 2018

From Right-Wing Watch comes a video which demonstrates a basic truth with the religious right In it, anti-LGBTQ activist Gordon Klingenschmitt tries to justify business discriminate against the LGBTQ community. That's how he started. Watch how quickly he moves to talking about an orgy.

If your stomach can handle it, take a gander at videos or literature coming from people like Klingenschmitt. The speed in which they move to speculating about gay sex is mind-boggling. And annoying. Debates about LGBTQ equality should be way more intelligent than breaking it down to fevered sexual images. But that's pretty much the only thing that many of these folks have.

Monday, February 19, 2018

Trump claimed that he would fight for the LGBTQ community, but that turns out not to be true.

Politico has just published a very detailed article which should be shared and remembered.In spite of Trump saying that if elected, he would fight for the LGBTQ community, his Administration has been steadily and meticulously dismantling policies at the nation's health department which would benefit us, our family, and our children. And this dismantling is negatively affecting LGBTQs who work there.

Instead of saying "well we already know this," the LGBTQ community should ask just who is leading Trump in this direction and when we find out who it is, we should direct all attention and vehemence to those individuals and groups. But let's not leave Trump out because you know we shouldn't forget about him either:

. . .upon taking office last year, the Trump administration swiftly froze a series of LGBT-friendly rules, including proposed new regulations to further ban discrimination in Medicare and Medicaid. A regulation that would have allowed transgender HHS staff more protections when using the department's bathrooms and other facilities also was ignored.

"It was signed and technically finished on Jan. 19, 2017, but not posted online," said one staffer. "And the new administration considered it unpublished and pulled it back."

The Trump administration also reinterpreted the ACA's Section 1557 anti-discrimination mandate, with the White House declining to fight a court battle to enforce it and signaling that it would roll back the rule. The health agency's new Conscience and Religious Freedom Division, which POLITICO first reported last month, is expected to offer greater protections for health care workers who do not wish to treat LGBT patients.

The article also points out how the Trump Administration has appointed appointed anti-LGBTQ activists in key positions and this has caused serious problems with gay employees at HHS:

Career staff say that, regardless of what agency leaders believe or maintain now, their past comments on LGBT priorities have been widely passed around the 80,000-person department. "I photocopied them and left them in the cafeteria," said one staffer. "It's important for people to know these are the leaders they work for."

It's also fostered a climate where six staffers who are LGBT described removing their wedding rings before coming to work in the morning, taking down photos of their partners and families or ultimately finding new jobs further away from certain political appointees. They did not want to be identified; two said they feared being reassigned for being gay.

This week, a shocking story hit the national news about an Ohio teenager who was removed from her parents' home by authorities. Why? Because they didn't support their daughter's decision to identify as a boy and declined to authorize hormone therapy to facilitate her gender "transition." Today, the story broke that Juvenile Court Judge Sylvia Hendon has permanently removed the child from her parents' custody (despite the fact that the child is already 17 and would be able to make medical decisions for herself in less than a year).

What's especially alarming is that a lawyer representing the child -- as well as Donald Clancy of the Hamilton County Prosecutor's Office -- cited the parents' religious beliefs as an argument for robbing them of their rights! The mom and dad are being criticized for seeking out a Christian therapist for their daughter and for daring to send her to Catholic school. Even so, the parents were clear that their stance on the gender transition wasn't motivated on faith alone. After all, they pointed out, they'd had lengthy consultations with medical professions and did hours of research on their own. Only then did they come to the conclusion that "this is not in their child's best interest." (The American College of Pediatricians -- not to be confused with the more "politically correct" American Academy of Pediatrics -- agrees.)

For years, LGBT activists have scoffed at warnings from FRC and others that the radical LGBT movement poses a threat to personal and religious freedom. In the past, the Left directed most of its attacks on religious expression in the public square, doing everything it could to restrict faith to the four walls of your house or church. Now, even that tolerance is tumbling down.

Here are some very important pieces of information that FRC omitted from the story:

1. The grandparents of the child are suing his parents for custody because they support his gender identity. So implying that "gay activists" and "the Left" are attempting to steal this child is simply false.

2. The situation had been called one of "life or death"

Medical experts testified that the father's ongoing refusal to call the child by his chosen name and the parents' rejection of the teen's gender identity have triggered suicidal feelings. The teen was hospitalized in 2016. He has been diagnosed with depression, an anxiety disorder and gender dysphoria, according to court records. Gender dysphoria is a psychiatric diagnosis the American Psychiatric Association defines as "a conflict between a person's physical or assigned gender and the gender with which he/she/they identify."

. . .The teen's court-appointed guardian believes that the grandparents, not the parents, should have custody and says they are best suited to help the child. The medical team from Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, where the child had been in treatment, testified that the teen is improving mentally and emotionally through therapy and because his grandparents have created a supportive environment. However, they believe the teen should start treatment as soon as possible to decrease his suicide risk.

Last but not least, the organization cited by FRC, The American College of Pediatricians, is an illegitimate medical group. It, like FRC, is designated as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center because it spreads homophobic propaganda under a scientific veneer.

The facts here are very clear. This is a case of transgender child's health and safety being jeopardized by his parents. And we know this because experts in the matter - health officials - say so.

In contrast, FRC is interjecting itself into the case with absolutely no expertise in the matter and touting statements from a phony medical group who doesn't have the credibility to prescribe cough medicine, to say nothing about commenting on this particular situation at hand.

FRC should butt out and leave the case to the people who know what they are doing and actually care about this child and his family.

Friday, February 16, 2018

Oh Look, Another One Of Trump’s Court Picks Is Really Anti-Gay - Let's be honest. Franklin Graham, the Family Research Council, and that bunch could care less about Trump's so-called moral behavior. They only say that crap when it comes folks who they can't use. As long as Trump gives them things like anti-LGBTQ court picks, they will turn a blind eye and deaf ear to his many faults.

Thursday, February 15, 2018

The anti-LGBTQ hate group Family Research Council would have you to believe that the above picture is one which celebrates honorable actions from Congressional leaders. FRC president Tony Perkins (right) is posing with Rep. Vicky Hartzler (R-MO) while he is presenting her with what is called a "True Blue" Award.

Despite some disappointments along the way, there's plenty to be happy about with the 115th Congress. Republicans, who had the benefit of working with a president with one of the most conservative agendas in history, had plenty to show for Donald Trump's first year -- especially on the issues that matter most.
For almost two decades, FRC Action has honored the men and women in the House and Senate who've stood strongest on faith, family, and freedom. This year, in a testament to the White House's productivity on values issues, we're proud to announce that this year's "True Blue" award went to a record-high 245 Members of Congress, who all scored a perfect 100 percent on our scorecard.

My guess is when it comes to Hartlzer, FRC made sure she got an award for going above and beyond the call of duty when it came to getting their agenda passed in Congress. You see, Hartzler took a lead role in defending Trump's failed attempt to ban transgender men and women from serving in the military.

It was she who reportedly pressured Trump for weeks to make his abominable decision to ban transgender troops.

It was she who last year pushed for a controversial amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act which would have banned the Pentagon from funding gender reassignment surgeries for service members. The amendment failed when 24 Republicans joined the Democrats to vote against it.

Finally, it was Hartzler who pushed inaccurate statistics to falsely claim that it was too costly for transgender men and women to serve in the military.

Hartzler deserves some type of award for her actions, for sure. But I don't think the award should have anything to do with "faith," "family," and especially not "freedom" when one takes into account how she treated those who fought for her freedom.

Wednesday, February 14, 2018

Right-wing evangelicals seem to have lies about Obama programmed in their heads.

The right-wing evangelicals of America are having another "everyone hates us because we love Jesus" pity party today. This one has to do with commentsThe View's Joy Behar made about Mike Pence's so-called Christian faith.

I'm not even going to try to explain this mess. I will just say that folks on that side of the political spectrum again figuratively drowned themselves with magnums of salty tears squeezed from pools of self-pity. It's another way in which they stroke their own egos by pretending to be God's chosen people in so-called sinful, demonic, homosexual ridden world. And of course they hoisted the guest of honor in their pity part, Mike Pence, on a throne of thorns, proclaiming him as the martyr of hostility to the "Christian" community, either ignorant of indifferent to the fact that if there were truly any growing hostility it would be in reaction to them thinking that they (right-wing, evangelical, predominantly white) are the only "true Christians" in America.

Case in point is an article via the American Family Association's fake news source, One News Now, chronicling the situation between Behar and Pence. Those who are familiar with One News Now already know that the article will be ridiculously one-sided. It's the comments which are golden. A certain individual (yours truly) made the strategic point to remind folks that it wasn't long ago that some of them attacked Obama's faith:

Your criticism of Behar may be warranted but I think there is an intentional decision to give this non-issue more attention than it deserves. Also, I can remember when a lot of folks upset over this didn't give Obama his respect when he spoke of his Christian faith.

Who knew that right-wing evangelical Christians could sprout fangs so quickly?

Imagine the group which published this monstrosity of lies being deemed too homophobic to attend a conservative conference.

Anti-LGBTQ Group MassResistance Says It’s Been Banned From CPAC- This is rich. Vile anti-LGBTQ hate group Mass Resistance says it has been banned from having a table at the yearly conservative gathering CPAC because it has been deemed too homophobic. It gets better. Mass Resistance claims that it was backstabbed by other groups, including another anti-LGBT hate group the Family Research Council. Meanwhile, 'Porno' Pete LaBarbera who leads another anti-LGBTQ hate group - Americans for Truth About Homosexuality - is adding his less than two cents into this argument by taking Mass Resistance's side. I don't know about you, but to me the idea of triple spontaneous combustion would be rather nice right now.

About Me

Alvin McEwen is 46-year-old African-American gay man who resides in Columbia, SC.
McEwen's blog, Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters, and writings have been mentioned by Americablog.com, Goodasyou.org, People for the American Way, PageOneQ.com, The Washington Post, Raw Story, The Advocate, Media Matters for America, Crooksandliars.com, Thinkprogress.org, Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish, Melissa Harris-Perry, The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, Newsweek, The Daily Beast, The Washington Blade, and Foxnews.com.
In addition, he is also a past contributor to Pam's House Blend,Justice For All, LGBTQ Nation, and Alternet.org. He is a present contributor to the Daily Kos and the Huffington Post,
He is the 2007 recipient of the Harriet Daniels Hancock Volunteer of the Year Award and the 2010 recipient of the Order of the Pink Palmetto from the SC Pride Movement as well as the 2009 recipient of the Audre Lorde/James Baldwin Civil Rights Activist Award from SC Black Pride. In addition, he is a three-time nominee of the Ed Madden Media Advocacy Award from SC Pride.